On the face of it the Pendragon is an altogether simpler product than the Poseidon. The new speaker is a two-way system -- the Poseidon was a three-way design -- that marries a 2m-tall ribbon driver that operates in a dipole fashion and is mounted in an open-baffle enclosure. This is coupled with a second sealed column that houses eight 8" woofers powered by a 70-kilogram Gryphon class-A/B amplifier that is rated to deliver 1000W of continuous power (4000W peak). The passive ribbon (your amplifier is used to drive it) is crossed over to the active bass section at 200Hz; therefore, the ribbon covers the entire audio band above that point for an effective crossoverless bandwidth of 200Hz to 30kHz. The bass section extends the system's frequency response down to 16Hz. The low frequencies can be tailored via remote controllable adjustments that include a Q setting, low cut, and bass level.

This system shown in these pages is an example of a commissioned audiophile Opal system with 27 inch bass speakers. Yes, you read correctly, four 27 inch bass speakers!

With a passion for pipe organ music our client was aiming to relive a childhood experience and to bring back fond memories and feelings from a special time in his life. The challenge was great; not only for us to find a way to provide this experience, but also for our client who needed to extend the limits of his imagination and work with us to make this happen.

As large pipe organ bass note sub-harmonics can reach below 16.4Hz, finding a way to faithfully reproduce the depths of notes created on these magnificent instruments was our first challenge. Our second challenge was to keep the cabinet design within the limits of the space provided.

Our resolution was a design to fit within room corners, and this surprisingly has minimum effect on consuming living space. The system height is designed to fit floor to ceiling 2.5 meters, 8ft.

Each speaker structure is made up with 3 cabinets. Two bass boxes: one inverted on top of the other and a 3-way centre box that fits within the 2 bass boxes. The centre box can be rotated 180deg, allowing the mid horn to be at the correct listening height when listening from a seated position.

These particular custom cabinets were painted with Mercedes metallic-grey auto duco however custom systems can be designed in a range of finishes to suit the client including high grade timber veneers.

This particular system was reviewed by Stephen Dawson from Australian Hi Fi Magazine in the March/April 2007 edition.

Custom Opal systems can be made in a range of sizes and finishes and to suit any environment, application and architectural design.

"The biggest thing about the Ultimate IIs, I think, can be described as relaxed resolution. The sense of transparency that the Ultimate’s give is absolutely top-notch. You hear detail as clearly as on any speaker I’ve heard. In this it is reminiscent of electrostatic speakers. But it is different from many of those electrostatic speakers in that you don’t have the sense that the detail is partially produced by the speaker as an artifact or “enhancement.” The detail just seems to be there as it is in reality. The resolution of the Ultimates is relaxed in the sense that it sounds like it is supposed to be there. It sounds like the detail is integral to the core sound (voice, horn, guitar, drum). Strain, glare, etch, fizz, and the like just aren’t part of the picture when playing good recordings.

The next area where the Ultimate IIs are exceptional is their dynamic capability. On the music Alon played for me, this was more a matter of what we might call “microdynamics”—the sense that each instrument is uncompressed. Each instrument breathes and pulses naturally when microdynamics are superb as they are with the Ultimates. That contrasts with “macrodynamics” which is the sense that the full orchestra or the band can go from quiet to full-tilt tutti without compression. I thought the Ultimate IIs were also very, very good in this area, but the music we played wasn’t primarily geared to show this off."